Former Downingtown East soccer player files lawsuit

PHILADELPHIA >> The parents of a “promising” high school girls soccer player have filed a federal lawsuit against their daughter’s former coach, the Downingtown Area School District and the district superintendent for a head injury she suffered during a scrimmage and for which they say she was not properly treated.

The parents, Thomas and Theresa Urban of Upper Uwchlan, claim in the suit filed Aug. 20 in U.S. District Court of Philadelphia, that their daughter has slipped in her academic work, continues to suffer from aftereffects of the injury and has not played a competitive soccer game since the incident in which Downingtown East Coach Craig Reed kept her in the game despite warnings from a teammate of her condition.

Citing violations to her civil rights against “state-created danger,” as well as negligence and recklessness on Reed’s behalf, the Urbans are asking for compensatory and punitive damages in excess of $150,000.

Aaron Freiwald, the Philadelphia attorney for the girl, who is identified only as “M.U.” in the 20-page lawsuit, did not return a call for comment. The school district does not comment on pending litigation.

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The suit states that on Aug. 20, 2012, M.U. was playing center midfielder for the varsity Downingtown East girls’ soccer team in a scrimmage against another school team. She was considered a potential starter for the team, the suit said, and Reed had pressured her to perform at a high level so that she could follow in the footsteps of other soccer players at the school who had gone on to play at Division I college programs.

She was also an “A” student while she was in middle school in the district, the complaint states.

At some point during the game, she and an opposing player went up for a header, and their heads collided. She felt her neck snap from the collision, and fell to the ground. She says in the suit that she heard the opposing coach, standing nearby, say that she should be taken out of the game and evaluated for a concussion.

One of her teammates thought the same thing, according to the suit, and approached Reed about the hit. However, the suit states that Reed continued to keep her in the game, and made the affirmative decision not to take her out and have her evaluated by the team staff. The suit says she suffered additional hits to the head during the remainder of the game.

Reed’s actions, the suit alleges, meshed with his competitive attitude. The complaint states that he pushed his players hard, scheduling 6 a.m. practices during summer breaks and sometimes requiring “workout sessions twice a day.” He also urged the girls to participate in a training program at an operation he was associated with at the time, Total Soccer.

M.U. felt sick on the bus ride home from the scrimmage, and the following day experienced dizziness and saw black spots. On Aug. 22, her parents took her to a doctor, and she was eventually diagnosed as suffering from a traumatic brain injury, according to the suit. She missed 80 days of school because of the injury.

She never played another competitive soccer game for the school, the complaint said.

“Her grades have fallen dramatically,” it states, going from “As” to “Bs” and “Cs.” “She has issues with concentration and memory. Her future is uncertain.”

The complaint charges that M.U. should have been taken out of the game and evaluated for a concussion. That would be in line with the state’s Safety in Youth Sports Act that went into effect in July 2012. The policy requires student athletes who have suffered head injuries be kept out of games until they have been medically evaluated and cleared for further play.

“If the coach and the school administration had acted appropriately and there had been appropriate policies in place to make sure that student safety was paramount, then M.U.’s brain injury would have been far less severe,” the complaint alleges.

But “this deliberate indifference to the health and safety of females athletes was common practice or custom on the soccer team and in the soccer program for which Coach Reed was responsible,” it states.

Reed, who now operates the athletic program, 360 Sports in Upper Uwchlan, about 2 miles from M.U.’s home, did not respond immediately to calls for comment.